The US military Sunday struck five targets in Iraq and Syria controlled by an Iranian-backed paramilitary group, the Pentagon said, a reprisal for a rocket attack Friday that killed an American contractor.
The airstrikes, carried out by Air Force F-15E fighter planes, hit three locations in Iraq and two in Syria controlled by the group, Kataib Hezbollah.
Jonathan Hoffman, the chief Pentagon spokesman, said the targets included weapons storage facilities and command posts that were used to attack US and partner forces.
A US response to an attack that kills or wounds Americans is not unusual. But Sunday’s retaliation involved direct strikes on Iranian proxies, making it particularly dangerous ground.
Since the US military returned to Iraq in 2014, Iranian-backed forces and US forces have refrained from attacking each other because of a common enemy: the Islamic State group. But the Islamic State group has lost its territory, and tensions have risen between Tehran and Washington over the Trump administration’s “maximum pressure” campaign.
Rocket attacks over the past two months by Iranian proxies threatened the uneasy peace, and Friday’s deadly strike broke it. The key question now is whether the US counterattack tamps down the cycle of violence or escalates it.
President Donald Trump was briefed by Defense Department leaders Saturday, and allowed the strikes to proceed. Senior officials including Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo traveled to Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on Sunday for discussions with the president, US officials said.
“What we did is take a decisive response that makes clear what President Trump has said for months and months and months,” Pompeo said Sunday, “which is that we will not stand for the Islamic Republic of Iran to take actions that put American men and women in jeopardy.”
Hoffman said the US would conduct additional strikes if the attacks by Kataib Hezbollah did not stop. Iranian proxy forces have carried out 11 attacks over the past two months on bases and facilities housing US contractors and service members, a US official said.
“Iran and their KH proxy forces must cease their attacks on US and coalition forces, and respect Iraq’s sovereignty, to prevent additional defensive actions by US forces,” Hoffman said.
Iran has long supported Kataib Hezbollah by providing weapons and other lethal aid. The group has tight ties with the Quds Force, an elite unit of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps, the Pentagon said. The US has labeled the Guards Corps a terrorist organisation.
Iraq’s Hezbollah fighters are among several armed groups that are close to Iran but also have the imprimatur of the Iraqi government because they fall under the Iraqi security forces. Iraq has deployed the group’s troops to the border with Syria to help defend against the Islamic State group. It has also facilitated the movement of Iranian arms and logistical support across the border to Syria, where Iranian troops are assisting President Bashar al-Assad’s government, according to Iraqi and US security experts.
The ammunition facilities that were struck Sunday held both rockets and drones used by Kataib Hezbollah. The command and control buildings had been used by the group to plot attacks. The ordnance dropped by the F-15Es on the ammunition depots set off several large secondary explosions, US officials said, confirming that the facilities were used to store a significant amount of weaponry.
Sayyid Jaafar al-Husseini, the Hezbollah military spokesman in Iraq, claimed that 24 were killed and more than 50 wounded. News media reports in Iraq said one man was a commander of a Kataib Hezbollah brigade. US officials have not been able to confirm how many members of the group were killed.
Hezbollah, responding to the attacks, said that “all options were available” and renewed calls for US troops to leave Iraq.
Officials did not identify the precise location of the sites. The strikes in Syria took place in the Euphrates River Valley in the southeast, officials said.
As rocket attacks by Iranian proxies have increased in recent weeks, some Defense Department officials have been worried that the situation could escalate beyond the kind of shadow conflict that the US and Iran have been engaged in.
The death of the US contractor and the response by the Pentagon could potentially lead to a further escalation. Iran could respond with a renewed roadside bomb campaign or more powerful rocket and missile attacks, a move that would most likely result in a more aggressive response by the US
US military commanders have warned for months about a growing risk of attacks by Iranian proxy forces on US interests and forces in the region, as Tehran chafes against the Trump administration’s renewed economic sanctions and campaign to force it to renegotiate the 2015 nuclear deal.
So far Iran and its proxies have mostly focused on American allies and partners. The US has accused Iran of striking at oil tankers in the Arabian Sea and launching drone and cruise missile attacks on Saudi oil facilities. Iran also shot down a US drone.
In response, the US launched a series of cyberattacks, but Trump backed away from a larger military airstrike.
